From WhatsApp to One Financial Home

Money was moving. The systems were not.

Money in Sierra Leone moves through cash, bank accounts, mobile money, cards and agents. Making those channels work together is an important part of improving everyday financial services. For Flot, the question is how to make that experience easier for the person using it. ^[1]

In July 2023, the World Bank described the inconvenience caused by limited interoperability between payment providers in Sierra Leone. The same report described the National Payment Switch, launched in May 2023, as a step towards connecting the country's payment systems. That history matters: improving connections between services has been a national effort, not a problem Flot discovered alone. ^[1]

Sierra Leone's Second National Strategy for Financial Inclusion (2022-2026) prioritises access to client-centred financial services, digital financial services and financial literacy, and financial education and consumer protection. ^[2]

We started where people already were

Flot was built inside that reality, with a practical question: how can money work in the places and ways people already understand? Our WhatsApp experience came before the Flot app.

Flot Chat put everyday money actions inside a conversation. Reporting on its April 2026 launch in Freetown, Premier News described a WhatsApp interface for sending money, card payments, airtime, electricity payments and merchant discovery. For people already using WhatsApp, the aim was to offer a familiar starting point. ^[3]

Jump Fence described the movement of money from one mobile money network to another. The phrase was playful, but the purpose was practical: making transfers across networks easier to navigate.

Built from experience, not theory

That focus shapes what Flot is becoming: one financial home. Flot is based in Freetown and operated by Open Hubb SL Limited. Its WhatsApp experience, app and work across personal money, business finance, cards and travel share one ambition: money should feel connected. ^[4][3]

This idea also reflects the path of Flot founder and Chief Executive Officer, David Kpakima. His earlier career crossed banking and telecommunications: a 2015 Northwestern University fellowship biography records experience at Zain, Airtel and Standard Chartered Bank. In 2021, Politico Sierra Leone identified him as Zoodlabs' Chief Operating Officer when reporting on a presentation to the Parliamentary ICT Committee in Freetown. ^[5][6][7]

That background matters because payments are not only a software problem. They sit at the meeting point of infrastructure, institutions, everyday habits and trust. Building for Sierra Leone requires understanding all four.

One idea. Many expressions.

That does not mean money should become invisible to the person who owns it. People should always have control, clarity and security. It means complexity should stop getting in the way. Technology should handle more of the coordination so people can focus on the reason for the payment: supporting family, running a business, preparing for a journey or simply getting through an ordinary day.

Our products share that ambition. WhatsApp offers a conversational entry point. The app brings a digital wallet, payments and transaction records together. Flot Business is designed to help merchants accept payments, while the app's published release notes also document flight booking and virtual Visa cards. Each is a different way to make financial tasks easier to manage. ^[3][4]

Built close to home

We are building close to home because context matters. Sierra Leone is not a footnote in someone else's fintech story. It is a market with its own behaviours, constraints and ambitions, and with people capable of building the systems they want to use.

We are also not building alone. The Bank of Sierra Leone describes the National Switch's instant payment service as connecting participating financial institutions for payments around the clock. Its guidance covers interoperability between banks, mobile money operators and other financial service providers. Flot's ambition is to help make a more connected financial experience useful in everyday life. ^[9]

That is who we are: a Sierra Leonean company building one connected way to move through financial life. And that is why we keep building. Not to add more noise to money, but to remove the friction around it.